Reprobación y sátira del gramático en las letras áureas. I. Diálogos y tratados, fines del siglo XVI

Abstract

In this article I analyze the progressive development of a number of ideas in Spanish language texts, from the middle of the XVIth Century on, that consolidated in Spain a deeply negative notion of the grammarian as it had been defended by the firsts humanists: as a specialist capable of doing high-level contributions in fields such as Law, Medicine or interpretation of the Scriptures. Since Huarte de San Juan’s Examen de ingenios or Pineda’s Dialogos familiares, until the texts written by Quevedo and Suarez de Figueroa at the beginning of the XVIIth Century, many Spanish intellectuals insisted on the grammarians’ alleged pedantry, ignorance, lack of moral authority or even heresy, in order to discredit every possible intent to applying the science of language to the other disciplines considered more serious or important.